Page 62 of Love Is Brewing

They were so damn big it’s not like he could inspect every shipment that came in. It was someone else’s job to do that and no one came to him or anyone else to question it.

He was marching to the other end of the building.

“Elias,” Tony said. “This isn’t right. Taste it.”

He reached for the cup and put it to his lips. It wasn’t going to taste anything like the finished product, but he knew damn well what it should taste like. It was his base. The first one he brewed.

Somehow it got messed with.

“I already know by the smell it’s bitter.”

It wasn’t horrible, but it wasn’t his.

“That’s what I thought too,” Kyle said. “Why did you change the brand of barley we use?”

“I didn’t,” he said again. “How many batches have used the wrong stuff?”

This was a nightmare. He’d have to decide to get rid of it all in the fermentation stage or let it go through the last few stages and see how it tasted.

His loyal customers were going to know the difference.

That was how you lost business.

And the last thing he needed was bad press or complaints when he was still working through his contract with the Fierces.

“Too many to count right now,” Tony said. “But not as many as it could have been.”

“Shit,” he said, running his hands through his hair. “We need to sort this out now. Let’s find out which ones used this new product with our existing brews and go from there. If it’s a new beer we might salvage it and just use the rest of what was purchased if it was a lot.”

Because everything he bought was in large orders.

“I’m on it,” Tony said. “I’ll stay until we get it figured out.”

“Thanks,” he said and marched right to his office to find out what the fuck went wrong.

Here he’d hoped for a nice relaxing day.

Imagine how much worse he’d feel right now if he hadn’t started his morning out as well as he had.

Maybe his brothers were right, and a woman could make all the difference in your life.

But was it a good thing since he’d been thinking of Phoebe so much and this happened under his nose?

20

FEWER EYES

“You’re dating Elias, the fifth son, right?”

“What?” she asked, turning around in the grocery store, her hand still on the apple she was putting in the produce bag.

She caught the part about her boyfriend’s name. Which she was secretly referring to him as. But the part about him being the fifth son and not referring to the local company he owned threw her off. The way it was phrased was what confused her.

“The guy that owns Fifth Kid Brewing,” the woman said. “Elias Carlisle. You’re dating him, right? I mean I’d think you’d know who he was and all.”

It was the way the woman was leaning into her and talking low as if she had some mystery she was trying to comprehend.

“I do know who Elias is,” she said, forcing a smile. “I’m assuming you know him?”

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